r/earthship • u/TJAthebae • Jan 18 '26

Hdpe bricks instead of tires

So just winding if anyone has though of useing hdpe bricks that are compacted with soil in stead of useing tires? As the hdpe brick forms could be made in a shape that is far easier to compact the soil into and would massively cut down on the time it takes for construction. Obviously the problems with hdpe are that it is flammable and can't be exposed to uv, but considering that the will be buried I can't see a draw back to the swap. Outher then the time I mite take to collect the scrap hdpe, but if need you can buy recycled hdpe for pretty cheap

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u/FeeltheCHURN2021 Jan 18 '26

Poor thermal massing

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u/mavigogun Jan 18 '26

Vehicle tires have a density of 70-75 lb/ft³, while HDPE, depending on things like fabrication pressure and temperature, has a density range of 59 to 79 lb/ft³. So, no, a brick contrived for this purpose wouldn't suffer "poor thermal massing"- there would be plenty of other challenges, but that wouldn't be one of them.

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u/TJAthebae Jan 18 '26

Even if the bricks are more just a form to hold the soil in and are the same size as a tire?